The Perfect Kiss Read Free Page B

was real and tangible and all-powerful. They all believed in Mama’s dying promise; that each of her daughters would find love and laughter and sunshine and happiness. Grace didn’t.
    Grace had no memories of her parents. She’d grown up in a cold, gloomy Norfolk mansion, not a sunny Italian villa. And unlike her older sisters, Grace had no guarantee, no promise of love from her dead mama to protect her.
    Grace had watched each of her sisters fall in love. Their happiness was real and enduring. And her sisters assured her repeatedly that it would happen for her, too, one day.
    One day a man will kiss you and you’ll know . . .
    Mama’s promise , they’d remind her. Mama’s promise.
    Grace had tried, so hard, to believe, tried, so hard, to fall in love, but she just . . . couldn’t.
    So she flirted and parried men’s advances, lightheartedly and with humor, ensuring that nobody would get hurt. And that nobody would suspect.
    The old man’s words would come back to haunt her whenever she was feeling sad and blue-deviled, whenever she’d failed—again—to feel more than a spark of attraction to some nice man. She couldn’t marry a man, even a nice one, whose kisses left her cold.
    It didn’t matter, she told herself for the thousandth time. Plenty of people managed to live without love. She could still make a perfectly good life for herself. More than good—she was determined it would be splendid!
    She was her own woman now—almost! She was almost one-and-twenty and about to take control of her own personal fortune. Once she had her fortune she could live how she liked, where she liked. She could have the splendid adventures her soul had craved all her life: travel to Egypt and Venice and Constantinople, see the wonders of the world, ride on a camel, cross the Alps in a basket as her parents had done—and she wouldn’t have to ask permission of anyone.
    If she married, her body would belong to her husband and so would her fortune. The carriage jolted and swung. No man’s kisses could possibly be worth that . . .
    “Tidy yourself, gel. You are all blown about!”
    “Yes, Sir John.” Grace’s hands rose to tidy her hair and again she got a shock as she felt the harshly dyed locks. Nobody would recognize her as Grace Merridew now.
    Under Grace’s instructions, Aunt Gussie’s maid, Consuela, had cut Grace’s hair shorter and dyed it dark brown. And in a stroke of genius, she’d used henna to paint indelible freckles all over Grace’s face and hands and around her neckline. The henna paste stained the skin and even washing failed to remove the false freckles.
    They would fade, Consuela had assured the horrified Aunt Gussie. Grace would need to redo them every so often, but in the meantime, the shortsighted Sir John would never suspect that brown-haired, heavily freckled Greystoke was in fact Miss Grace Merridew whose red-gold hair and pure, peaches-and-cream complexion was famous. He had only met Grace a few times since the girls had left boarding school. As herself, and in the right context, he would probably recognize Grace, but not, she’d gambled, like this. She was right.
    She felt a pang for the loss of her long, red-gold hair. Melly’s babies , she reminded herself for the umpteenth time.
    Grace didn’t share Melly’s passion for babies. She liked children, but only after they’d started walking and talking and had become small people. But Melly adored babies, even the doughiest, dribbliest, smelliest ones.
    Melly’s dreams were simple. She didn’t want a lord or a fine London house or lots of money. She just wanted a nice man who would love her and marry her and give her lots of babies. It was what every girl dreamed of, Grace believed.
    Every girl except Grace.
    Which is why she was so determined Melly’s dreams would not be sacrificed. Cutting off her hair was nothing. Hair grew back. People’s dreams didn’t. Dreams shattered, and sometimes, so did the people.
    Lord D’Acre, Dominic